


Prologue

by charlaine2124



Series: Emrys, Immortal [1]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: After 513, Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-04
Updated: 2013-01-04
Packaged: 2017-11-23 16:08:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 699
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/624027
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/charlaine2124/pseuds/charlaine2124
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Merlin watches the world grow and forget Arthur</p>
            </blockquote>





	Prologue

The first time Merlin found himself by the lake again was nearly four hundred years later. He contemplated, as he looked out over the murky water, the changes that he had seen in Albion as he had watched. Never interfering, never stepping out and up into the place that many a ruler would gladly have given him, he watched Camelot as it basked in its Golden Age.

Arthur, however, was not there to witness it.

Magic flourished once more. Children ran amongst conjured flowers in the depths of winter and watched formless dragons dance in the air. The people prospered, and all the Kings of Albion came to Camelot to share in the wealth, the beauty and the majesty that the new Queen had ushered in.

All of this she did without her King.

Soon all were united under the Pendragon line. Merlin saw Gwen grow into a beautiful and just Queen, even as her belly swelled with the last remnants of Arthur in this world. Merlin couldn’t help but sneak unseen into the back of the boy’s coronation and chant with tears in his eyes “The Queen is dead. Long live the King.” Edgar Arthur Pendragon – First King of all Albion. And so the years had passed and as Kings and Queens came and went magic began its slow decline. There was no sudden halt; it just faded as science began to truly flourish.

A history, written by Sir Geoffrey of Monmouth, came into Merlin’s possession at some point. It detailed Arthur’s reign and the people who had served by his side almost faultlessly. The old warlock couldn’t help but flick thorough it and silently read the names of his friends again and again, as if the act of wishing could bring them all back to him, take them all back to the time before Arthur was King and while the world was not perfect it was so much simpler and happier. The history named him, Merlin, as the Sorcerer at Camlann so he would be remembered and recognised for what he had done, but never did he read it to the end. That was one day that he couldn’t bring himself to live through a second time. And he watched as the story grew and changed and wished that it had been so, that even with that terrible end they had ruled together as King, Queen, Sorcerer and Knight.

Emrys, immortal, lived on.

So when he came to the lake, it was no accident that he was angry. That he shouted at the Old Gods for their games and at the sun for its shining and the lake for its indifference. But the Old Gods had not listened to the cries of men even before they had begun to fade away, and the sun continued to shine on the undisturbed water. And Merlin’s magic had been locked away too long for anything other than the sound of his sobs to move the world around him.

When he had calmed, he spent long hours looking out onto the lake. They were building a church out there on the isle, a fortress of a new religion. Even all these centuries later they could feel the power there, the calling that Merlin could always feel to some degree. It was as if everyone could feel it; that somewhere on that isle lay a man greater than they could ever hope to be. And so they drew near in order to simply witness.

He left that time, heart still heavy; still hurting. Because despite it all, the world was forgetting, and Merlin wasn’t sure he could ever forgive them.

Later again, another six centuries, and he was back. This time the rain came down to match his silent tears and compensate for the now dry lakebed. Though he stood at the exact spot where he had spoken his last farewell, he could no longer see the Isle. Now it was simply a hill, rising above trees that were growing in the rich soil. He gazed to where he knew the isle stood and said nothing - thought nothing.

The very land of Albion was forgetting.

Emrys, immortal, lived on.

Watching,

Listening,

Waiting.


End file.
